isabel's first day of school

We managed to get one photo before rushing off to school. We have a bit of a commute to school and we had a challenge getting all three kids up and ready way earlier than normal. We were only a few minutes late the first day. After careful consideration and research we decided to send Isabel away to Kindergarten this year. She goes to a school where they teach in spanish in the morning and english after lunch and then a few "specials" like PE, music and art. We figure if all the schools want to have her for a ridiculous 7 hours, at least we'll send her where she can get some spanish in there too.

There was a lot of anticipation leading to the first day of school. We had to buy her school supplies and uniforms. We practiced spanish and talked a lot about what school would be like. She was really excited. I heard her telling Ansel that when we took her to school he could not go with her to her class. Ansel was surprised and asked her why he couldn't go to school with her. It was pretty cute hearing them talk about it. She also practiced packing up her special pony backpack and lunchbox so many times before the big day.

She has always REALLY loved doing things herself and being super independent. So, I wanted her to be responsible for making her own lunches. She was thrilled to pack her own lunch for the first day of school. Tonight before she packed her lunch for the third day of school she said she didn't feel like doing it. I asked what she would eat for lunch if she didn't pack it and she said she wanted me to pack it for her. I was busy cleaning up from dinner so she did it. I hope that we can keep up the routine of her doing it. When I asked her what her favorite thing at school was she said nothing...but she was excited to go back for day #2. So, what more could we want.

Oh, here is a crazy story. So, when Joseph went to pick Isabel up from the first school she was in the line to ride the bus home. (They even wrote her bus number on her hand.) When she walked away with Joseph, the teacher (who doesn't speak much english) came after and asked what was going on, isn't she riding the bus. I don't know HOW Isabel could have gotten on a bus list because I never even got any information on busing because I knew we were not going to do it. Also, we have moved since I enrolled and the school had our OLD address. So, we were a little freaked out thinking of our poor sweet little 4 year old girl getting kicked off a bus in a bad part of town nowhere near where we live now. I'm just very proud of my husband for being early to pick her up. Needless to say, we have personally told the teacher and office several times that Joseph will be picking her up, we updated information over the phone with the school and filled out additional paperwork turned into the office.

strawberries

Lincoln figured out how to use his teeth. He has two on the bottom and two more coming in on top. We found strawberries on sale today and we ALL enjoyed them, especially Lincoln.

dancing

One of our favorite things to do is hang out and listen to Joseph play the guitar. Isabel and Ansel have started running around in a big circle. They go slowly on the slower parts and fast and the faster parts. Well, Joseph and I were both really surprised when we saw Lincoln join in the fun!

clapping

Lincoln has starting doing some new cute things...

the phone call

I was enjoying a shower this morning and heard a knock on my bathroom door. I always hear their requests because you never know if they really have a problem. Well, today Ansel came in and said someone had called. I asked who it was and he paused, then I heard someone on the phone say "Cindy." Then Ansel repeated "Cindy." (I didn't see the phone in his hand and I assumed he was no longer on the phone.) Cindy told me that she was deciding if she should wait on the phone or just hang up and call back, ha ha ha. Anyway, it's usually Isabel who answers the phone if I'm not around. It was really funny to see Ansel do it and successfully! He must have seen Isabel do it so many times that when the phone rang he thought...Oh, this is what I should do.

July 4th

We had a fun 4th of July. The fireworks out here in Kansas are so much better than the legal ones out west. Joseph's favorite holiday is the 4th and so we usually get a ton of fireworks. This year we scaled back a lot, but since we are here in Kansas we still had our best show yet. We got some artillery shells. Those are the kind that you shoot out of a launcher and "real" fireworks shows have them. We got six that shot up into the air 70 ft and then exploded out about 50 ft. Also, we were not the only ones in our neighborhood to get some sweet ones. It was pretty cool.

We went to another "tea party" rally and Joseph ended up being the featured speaker. So, that was pretty exciting and went well. It's posted on youtube. This is the link to the highlights. The full version (about 30 mins) is also posted too.

Happy Forth of July!!!

more photos

Lincoln has started crawling!! We had to get the gates up already. Look out...here comes Lincoln. It's cute when he follows me around the room or house. The first time he crawled was when I was leaving. I kissed everyone goodbye and he started crying and trying to crawl to me. It was so cute I decided I would have to be late to where I was going.


Isabel LOVES playing with Lincoln. She especially likes it when he crawls on her and grabs her face. Which is great because it's also one of Lincoln's favorite things to do too.

I came downstairs to check on the kids playing and Isabel had made a "piano." I thought the set up was pretty cool and we all took turns playing the piano.